


Distraction

by thegirlwiththemouseyhair



Category: The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
Genre: Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes, Victorian Attitudes, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-21
Updated: 2014-12-21
Packaged: 2018-03-02 17:27:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2820290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegirlwiththemouseyhair/pseuds/thegirlwiththemouseyhair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I hope this fits your prompt, recip. I find it hard to compete with Wilde unless I can come at the text a bit sideways, and doing a sidelong glance at Dorian from an OC’s perspective seemed to fit that bill. The narrative presents Dorian as “fatal” to so many of his friends and lovers, but I think some people in his life likely realized something was very wrong and just “noped” relatively early on. Also, I see this as being fairly late in the novel, and I do think that Dorian and Lord Henry probably had phases in which they were apart more, as Harry seems so clueless about Dorian by the last couple of chapters.</p></blockquote>





	Distraction

**Author's Note:**

  * For [disenchanted](https://archiveofourown.org/users/disenchanted/gifts).



It wasn’t the sort of love – the sort of _thing_ – you could expect to end well, and Stephen supposed a man with sense wouldn’t go in for it at all. A man with good sense would steer clear of the danger, the sordidness.

Apparently Stephen Ashby wasn’t a man with good sense. He’d loved Percy Baden when they were at university together, really loved him, and before that he’d been so fond of Walter Smythe when they were at public school as to put the other boy off. But Stephen’s friendship and fascination with Dorian were different and worse still. The burning, all-consuming need he felt to be with the other man, to sit by him and hold his attention to the exclusion of all other friends at his club or at parties, and his ache to be with Dorian in his bedroom at Selby on those evenings when Dorian found some excuse to send away as many of the staff as he could. As far as sins went he much preferred those nights to the renters Dorian had introduced him to in the East End.

But Stephen never could have Dorian to himself, could he? There would always be someone, or something, that came between them. Sometimes there was Dorian’s great friend Lord Henry Wotton, who displaced Stephen and everyone else when he and Dorian weren’t in one of their distant phases. Dorian had quite an interest in Lord Henry’s sister, too, for a season, until he tired of her. People talked a great deal when their association ended. Stephen hated to hear Dorian abused, yet he could barely contain his own jealousy and frustration. It was right, wasn’t it? Right for him to _be_ jealous and, in a sense, right for people to talk.

There were many other distractions in Dorian’s life, too. Sometimes Dorian actually became close to one of his East End boys, until the inevitable blackmail attempts which were quickly stopped. Too quickly, perhaps. Then again, all that was to be expected, considering the life men like them had embraced.

Dorian’s other, stranger lapses were _not_ to be expected, however. There were evenings Stephen thought they would spend together until Dorian grew agitated and snappish, and would manufacture a quarrel or find some excuse to dash out of his own house in the middle of the night, leaving Stephen alone. What was he to do then? The practicalities alone made him shudder with fear and rage, really. He would not even speak to the complete absurdity of his friend’s conduct. What could call for it? People talked about Dorian’s secrets. If he had any that were worse than what Stephen already knew – what he had already shared with Dorian – then quite frankly, Stephen didn’t want to know.

And that was how he found himself writing that final letter to Dorian. It was a wrench, doing it. Even the paper, from that fine Austrian set that felt like linen to the touch, had been a gift from Dorian. As he wrote, Stephen could not help thinking of everything he’d learned from Dorian, about art and literature and the grandeur of history that men seldom remembered in this century. Their talks had been fascinating, and had left Stephen with a hunger for more, as he felt after sex. He doubted that he would ever come across anything as exquisite and as daring as this friendship.

Yet his lip curled when he thought of Dorian’s attacks of shaking hands and sudden viciousness before tearing away into the night. No scandal had touched Stephen or his family yet. He preferred to keep it that way. He had his parents to consider, as well as the older brother and sister-in-law who had always been great friends to him, and their infant son. He couldn’t have word of his _leanings_ or something worse reach any of them, and he was growing more and more aware that there was worse out there. Call him a coward, but that was a price he would not pay to be one of Dorian’s distractions.

He signed the letter.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope this fits your prompt, recip. I find it hard to compete with Wilde unless I can come at the text a bit sideways, and doing a sidelong glance at Dorian from an OC’s perspective seemed to fit that bill. The narrative presents Dorian as “fatal” to so many of his friends and lovers, but I think some people in his life likely realized something was very wrong and just “noped” relatively early on. Also, I see this as being fairly late in the novel, and I do think that Dorian and Lord Henry probably had phases in which they were apart more, as Harry seems so clueless about Dorian by the last couple of chapters.


End file.
